Voyager 2 cheats the power budget for another year

Engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have eked out a little more life for instruments aboard the veteran Voyager 2 probe thanks to a power-saving effort called the "Big Bang." The procedure involved switching several powered devices at once, turning some off and replacing others with lower-power alternatives while …

[Doctor Syntax]

Engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have eked out a little more life for instruments aboard the veteran Voyager 2 probe thanks to a power-saving effort called the "Big Bang."

AI data centre operators please copy.

[Paul Herber]

They're now hoping power will last until the universe ends at the Gib Gnab.

[KittenHuffer]

I thought it ended at Milliways!

[The Oncoming Scorn]

I've seen it

It's nothing but a gnab gib.

[Rattus]

Thats at the other end...

[Pascal Monett]

Now THIS is engineering

It is unbelievable in the Trump era that anyone that knows how to use his mind and his experience to further the knowledge of Science for Humanity would still have a job.

Yet, here we are.

Go NASA scientists !

[DoctorNine]

Re: Now THIS is engineering

The advantage folks at NASA and JPL have, is that politicians like to trot them out occasionally as show ponies, to prove 'American Ingenuity Is The Biggliest'. So, as long as they do PR when directed, they are left pretty much to their own devices to do the actual science that matters. This show is near its closing date despite all that, though. 'Twill be a sad day when it goes dark...

[drankinatty]

Re: Now THIS is engineering

It truly is remarkable engineering, from the time the mantra at NASA was design it, cut metal, build it, and go fly. When engineers far outnumbered the managers and "meetings to discuss the agenda for the next meeting" had not yet turned the agency into a bloated bureaucratic mess, and before the concept of "public-private partnerships" drained the agency of institutional knowledge in what turned out to be the subsidization of the "private" side of the partnerships at taxpayer expense.

Somehow I don't see any more Voyager type missions that benefit the public and science coming from the "private" space "businesses" that remain. There is a deep lesson there for us all.

[The Oncoming Scorn]

The Pint To All Concerned In This Venture Thread

Past & present (& hopefully a longer future than we dare hope) - Have a beer!

[SkippyBing]

Call themselves engineers? It's exceeded its design life 12 times over, think of all the excess weight they could have lost!

[the spectacularly refined chap]

Colin Chapman: A car that gets to the end of the race in one piece is too heavy.

[Paul Herber]

Who'd have thought that naming a sports car range after a flower would work?

Petunia? Daisy? ...

[The Organ Grinder's Monkey]

The ghosts of Jochen Rindt & Graham Hill might have a "contrasting" opinion?

[the spectacularly refined chap]

Graham Hill died in a plane crash, but yes the point stands, Chapman got plenty of flak at the time for building fragile cars, even compared to the standards of the day.

These days it tends to be more the sheer bloody mindedness that people remember. It's difficult not to smile when you hear the story of Chapman arguing with scrutineers that paper is a fireproof material.

[williamyf]

I wonder

How long before NASA starts to cycle the scientific instruments. Turn one on for 6 months, verify it is operational, do science with it, turn it off, turn the next one on, verify, do science for 6 months, lather rinse repeat.

At least, with that cadence, we get snapshots of what is happening in Depp space.

[DJV]

Re: Depp space

Arr! Is that somewhere in the Caribbean?

(Yeah, damn the 10-minute edit window!)

[MachDiamond]

Re: I wonder

"Turn one on for 6 months, verify it is operational, do science with it, turn it off, turn the next one on, verify, do science for 6 months, lather rinse repeat."

Most of what they turned off hasn't been doing anything all that useful and some instruments are just so far out of calibration that any data they might collect has error bars that make it useless. At the last, it may just be able to keep saying "hello" and I'd still find money spent to listen as worthwhile.

[just4this]

The future

It will eventually run out of power.

Drift aimlessly for a while.

Fall into a black hole and emerge on the far side of the galaxy.

Bump into a planet of living machines.

Receive some upgrades.

Head back to find its creator destroying inferior lifeforms along the way.

Encounter Kirk, Spok and crew.

Be dealt with.

This is all foretold in the teachings of Roddenberry.

[KittenHuffer]

Re: The future

It's just a pity that the nearest black hole to earth (currently known) is just over 1,500 light years away, and with Voyager 2 travelling at roughly 55,000km/h, it would take roughly 30 million years to reach it, even if it was heading in the right direction (it's close...ish, but space is really big).

And if there were to be a black hole close enough for it to fall into within 2-300 years then it would be within 10-15% of a light year, and I'd be far more worried about the black hole than Vger!

[Chloe Cresswell]

Re: The future

"(it's close...ish, but space is really big)"

I thought it was a long way down the road to the chemists, but that's just peanuts compared to space.

[just4this]

1,500 light years away

How long would it take if it floated along a Vogon constructed hyperspace express route?

[Paul Herber]

Re: 1,500 light years away

We could always send Marvin out to stop it.

[Excused Boots]

Re: The future

True, but if I recall the original movie, what Spock said was that Voyager 6 fell into what was believed at the time to be a black hole. Implying that it was something else.

And as for a close black hole, depends on its mass.

[just4this]

Re: The future

I believe you are right.

There is, I found after a quick search, a book ‘The Return’. In it Voyager 6 fell into a Borg transwarp conduit.

That possibility no doubt being a valid option because of Spocks actual words ‘believed at the time’.

[Simon Harris]

Re: The future

Ah, the optimism of Rodenberry thinking there would be at least 6 Voyagers.

Still, since then we've have New Horizons which will leave the solar system and a bunch of planetary orbiters and landers.

[Little Mouse]

Dumb question time

"generate enough heat to keep the spacecraft warm"

What temperature actually qualifies as "warm" in this scenario?

[Excused Boots]

Re: Dumb question time

I think they are mostly concerned about keeping the (remaining) fuel from freezing. Hydrazine needs to be above some 2 degrees C to remain liquid. So that’s the, sort of, ball park figures.

[IGotOut]

The aliens will find it...

...and come to Earth wondering how far we've come since launching the probes.

Upon arriving they will find a desert wasteland, full of data centres, generating AI slop, so that the AI bots can slurp it up in order to create more AI slop.

At which point the Aliens will go "Not another one did they learn nothing from the Dinosaurs and Atlantis? Fire the meteorites"

[just4this]

Re: The aliens will find it...

They checked out all the data in their lists

And then the alien anthropologists

Admitted they were still perplexed

But on eliminating every other reason

For our sad demise

They logged the only explanation left

This species has amused itself to death

Roger Waters Amused To Death

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ira_ovqnnNk&list=RDIra_ovqnnNk&start_radio=1

[Anonymous Coward]

23 light hours ---

--- is about 1.54e10 miles.

15,500,000,000 miles.

Or 2,256,363,636,363 London buses (approximately).

Kudos to the designers and the current operators of Voyager(s)

[the spectacularly refined chap]

Re: 23 light hours ---

Yebbut.. how many El Reg Standard double decker buses? The Boris bus is retired now. Please use standard Linguine. We don't speak foreign measurements here.

[Bebu sa Ware]

Re: 23 light hours ---

> 15,500,000,000 miles.

Well overdue for timing chain replacement not to speak of the overdue oil change. Some people just do not know how to look after their motor.

Seriously though a remarkable achievement 23 light hours. RTT 46 hrs — would be "fun" to run TCP over. ;)

[munnoch]

Refreshing

To read a story about real engineering instead of the continuing onslaught of AI...

[MachDiamond]

A good story

The whole Voyager story from concept today is what you get from a science driven group. Somebody spots a planetary alignment coming that lets a probe launched with a primitive chemical rocket fly by a load of the solar system's planets. Some smart manager says "go". Rooms full of science nerds are given a goal and sh... things happens. No endless meetings and approvals and budget wranglings that go on past the launch window.

[Anonymous Coward]

Lucky bastards

Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 are just about far enough away from the AI disease as is recommended.

[Anonymous Coward]

Designed for 5yr and lasted for 50 what kind of shareholder value does that deliver!

This is interestinly speculative - https://www.space.com/predicting-voyager-golden-records-distant-future

"Both Golden Records are highly likely to survive at least partially intact for a span of over 5 billion years"

With an outside chance of the voyagers still being around for the heat death of the universe.

[Simon Harris]

Not just the spacecraft had extended missions.

Edward Carroll Stone Jr. was the lead project scientist when the Voyage program was started in 1972.

He retired from that position at the age of 86 in 2022.

He was also Director of JPL from 1991 to 2001 as well as PI of many other projects.